Badlands ****

-----------SPOILERS----------

Badlands is the first, and probably most accesable, Terrence Malick film. It is the least beautiful and the most depressing. For this film Malick grabs the myth of the heroic couple on the run and tears it to pieces. Rather than becoming a martyr, Sheen's character is caught and we watch him throw bits of memorabilia to admiring cops. We've just watched him senselessly and pointlessly murder innocent people, yet the national guard surrounds him looking at him like he's a hero.

Kit Cruthers (Martin Sheen) is a garbageman in a small South Dakota town. One day he sees the new girl in town twirling a baton in her backyard. The girl's name is Holly Sargis. Her father (Warren Oates) , who is widowed (she tells us in her creepily apathetic and detached narration he had kept their wedding cake in a refrigerator for 10 years) just moved them here from Texas.



Holly is 16. Kit is 25. Every move of his seems to be a complete imitation of James Dean. Kit combs his hair and dresses like James Dean. Hell, Martin Sheen looks more than a little like James Dean. And, we've been expecting it, when Holly finally tells us Kit "looked just like James Dean." The two fall in love and when Holly's father finds out about it, he shoots her dog. At this point of the movie we are siding with Holly and Kit, and when Kit accidentally shoots Holly's father, we can forgive him. We can forgive him when they burn the house and run away. And we watch with enjoyment as they build a treehouse and live completely off the land. We can even forgive him when Sheen shoots the three cops who are looking for him to collect the reward. After all, it was self defense. But our sympathy is beginning to disappear. Kit never seems to show a vulnerable side, and we wonder if he has one.

He is nasty to Holly. And in one masterfully played out scene, our sympathies for both characters vanishes. Kit casually kills completely innocent people that were trying to help him. And Holly looks impassively on as if nothing unusual had happened. She tells us in her voice over it occured to her then that Kit was a very "trigger-happy" person. And this has occured to us too.

The two of them cross the border to Montana, but when they are cornered by a helicopter Holly refuses to follow Kit. Kit stares straight into the camera furiously and for a moment we feel Holly's terror. Sheen has become such an imposing figure that we fear being in Holly's shoes.

In the end, Malick has carefully led us through the traps and obstacles of a cliched film to the conclusion that they were simply this: publicity seeking murderers. Although the film never thinks they are completely evil (see Linda Manz's comment on good and bad people in Days of Heaven it does let us know we are wrong for glorifying them. If any half of the man should be praised, it should be the angle half, not the devil half.

The 40 Year Old Virgin **1/2

"The 40 Year Old Virgin" is one of the most strangely ovverated films I've seen of 2005. It doesn't anything incredible to offer more than the average dumb comedy, yet critics and audiences obsessed over it. I was expecting much more when I decided to see it. And what a terrible disappointment.

But it's not a bad movie, and there are often hysterical moments, many involving Steve Carell, one of the greatest comedians of the past few years. But director Judd Apatow and co writer Carell never seem to be aiming as high as the pedestal this film was put on. The movie occaisonally slips back into standard spoof movie cliches and this is so frustrating it distracts from the overall quality of the film. And let's face it: the ending is terrible. Do we really need a musical number of "Aquarius" at the end? The film is funniest when it lets some of the supporting actors take control of the script and make it funnier than it would originally seem. The first 2/3 of this movie I would put under "very good." But by the last third the supporting actors are no longer valued and the movie becomes contrived and annoying. Some have said Catharine Keener should have gotten a nomination for this instead of Capote because she was "misused" in Capote. Rather, it's the other way around - in Capote she exposes layer upon layer of emotions that are never obvious because she never speaks her mind. In The 40 Year Old Virgin she never gets a chance to show good acting or even comedy. Her function is to be the "striaght" character (think a modern day, sexier Margaret Dumont) and deliver standard, predictable lines.

Often times the film feels choppy and confusing. The direction the characters are going in are confusing. Scenes end too quickly and begin too quickly. The plot, quite often, is extremely confusing, especially around the transition between the second and third thirds of the movie.

But let me talk about Steve Carell. The man is hilarious. And for the first two thirds, he is given free reign. And maybe he does deserve a nomination for best actor...

Well, looking at the lineup that year, maybe not quite. But in the top 10, certainly. Carell is the Brando of comedy. His very eyes and slight twitch of the mouth are executed perfectly, and throws everything into making us laugh. I admire him for doing so and cannot wait to see his future films.

Midnight Cowboy ****

There are some who have called Midnight Cowboy the greatest film ever made, and I can understand where they're coming from. I once thought so and perhaps once again will in the future. I haven't seen Midnight Cowboy in a long time, and perhaps I've forgotten. The film is one of the 5 most devastatingly sad films I've ever seen. The two superb lead performances are by John Voight and, especially, Dustin Hoffman, in his 2nd big film role (the first being The Graduate). Midnight Cowboy is the only film to get an "X" rating and win best picture (it definetely doesn't deserve an X rating, and was rerated "R" a few years later by an embarrased MPAA). It is also (I don't believe this!) the only "X" rated film to be viewed by a president in office. But Shelsinger wasn't surprised by the rating. He said: "Well, we did make the film for adults. It's not something you'd take your 7-year-old to."

Now, it's acclaimed as one of the greatest films ever made, but still, in my opinion, a little undderated. Very few films in history have come close to this great filmmaking.

In a middle-of-nowhere Texas town, naive Joe Buck (John Voight) dreams of becoming a prostitute in New York city, servicing many lonely, aging women. As we begin the film he is already packing for his trip. No one seems to take him seriously. We don't know much about Joe at first, but through confusing, dreamlike flashbacks, some points become clear: He was raised by his grandmother, who we see spanking him as a child in some of the flashbacks. Joe, as a teen, falls for a girl, who, when they are in the back of a car, is raped by Joe's jeleaous gang of friends. It's implied Joe may have been raped too, and this seems especially disturbing later.

Joe arrives in New York after a brilliantly edited sequence in which the people sitting next to him on the bus get steadily less sociable as he travels further north. As "Everybody's Talkin'" plays on a faraway radio, Joe, as the bus enters New York, fantasises countless women all looking for a man of just his description.

New York, however, seems to be a letdown. We watch involvingly embarrasing scenes where Joe tries to pick up women in their 50's, and runs so low on money he is eating ketchup packets on rolls. He finally does manage to pick up a woman (Sylvia Miles, shortest Oscar nominated performance in history) , but, after a tryst in her apartment, cannot convince her to pay him - she is so shocked and angry he ends up paying her. Only later does he realize he has been conned by a master.

Joe is kicked out of his apartment, and the man who owns the building (perhaps noticing his naivity) refuses to let him even get his things from the room. Finally Joe Buck looks around one night and realizes all the other men dressed as cowboys are gay prostitues. He makes a decision and goes into a dark theater with a young student (then unknown Bob Balaban). Schlesinger exercises his cruelest sense of humor here: the movie playing is Moonraker, and he makes the opening clip as suggestive as possible. Then Joe discovers the student doesn't have anything to pay with. He wants to steal his watch but takes pity on the student after he whines pitifully that it's his mother's watch.



He may have finally found help with a street bum who takes pity on him, played by Dustin Hoffman. The character's (and what a character!) name is Enrico Salvatore Rizzo, or, as Joe calls him, Ratso. Ratso is a crippled, sick con man who lives in an abandoned building where he generously allows Joe to live in an extra cot. The two form an unlikely friendship. It's winter and they are freezing to death. There are failed plans to seduce women at hotels, and while Ratso waits outside he imagines being in Miami, playing poker with old ladies, and even racing Joe on the beach (impossible because he is crippled). It is Ratso's dream to live in Miami.

Joe and Ratso eventually sell their only solace, the radio, Joe's last item from Texas. Ratso visits his father's grave. He steals flowers from someone else's grave to lay on his fathers.

Much more will happen, and, in a cliche used many times since, just when it seems Joe and Ratso "have it made" there is only more heartbreak. John Barry's haunting score drives many audiences to tears in the final scene. Just listening to it brings back the power of the movie.

Schlesinger, an outspoken homosexual (some have argued there are homosexual themes between Joe and Ratso - I disagree with this, I think they are just really close friends) had directed many films previously, but this was his first American one (he led Julie Christie to an Oscar in the satire Darling and brought more credibility to his name with Far From the Madding Crowd, among others). He brings an angry, anti-establishment tone to much of this film (used in scenes where Joe, starving to death, sees a gigantic Coca Cola sign blaring down on him), and it is anger as well as sadness that prevails in the end, right up to the apathetic bus passengers who simply turn away.

NEW RELEASES The Queen ****

Director: Steven Frears

Cast: Helen Mirren, Michael Sheen, Helen McCrory, James Cromwell

The Queen begins watching Helen Mirren, in one of the greatest performances this year as Queen Liz, sit in her royal attire staring forward coldly. She is being painted. She pauses to stare straigt at us and the audience feels welcomed to chuckle. Tony Blair is about to be, to her disappointment, elected Prime Minister of the England. Here is a clever, subtle, and wise comedy of manners and drama of opinions. The film takes place the week following the death of Princess Diana (she only appears in stock footage) , where more modernized Blair tries to convince the old fashioned Queen to hold a public funeral for Di. Mirren is shocked by the very idea (why does the entire population of England mourn for her anyway?), and we cower in fear while Sheen marches on, boldy throwing off figures like "70% of the population think your actions have damaged the monarchy." In lesser days Blair would have been beheaded.

The Royal family isn't portrayed as the nicest of families, especially Prince Philip, who, after Diana's children have just learned of her death, casually suggests he take them out hunting again so they'll forget it. Elizabeth the First drinks heavily while watching her daughter's adress to the nation on TV. Outside of the palace, Michael Sheen gives an equally riveting performance as Tony Blair (he played him previously in a TV flim also directed by Shears) and Helen McCrory as his anti royalist wife (she gets a hilarious scene in the beginning of the film).

I'm not sure if any of these things happened in real life but I enjoy watching them. The greatest scene involves a Stag, allowing Mirren to break character and show some humanity, even if, in an epilogue, she seems as cold as ever only a few months after Diana's death (and regrets the television appearance).

Shears has crafted a wonderful film that is almost without flaws. It is a complete escape of the theater in every defintion of the word and a very fun time at the Cinema.

NEW RELEASES Babel ****

Directed by: Alexandero Gonzalez Innarity
Starring: Rinko Kikuchi, Adriana Barazza, Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Koji Kakusho, Gael Garcia Bernal

In Innaritu's Babel, the third in a trilogy of films with similar themes (the first two being Amores Perros and 21 Grams, 4 different stories contain tragedy caused by the language barrier. A Morrocan family buys a gun from a local merchant so their sons can scare the jackals away. The two sons play with the gun on a mountaintop to see if it can shoot as far as the merchant said it could. One of them, clearly the better shot, shoots at a faraway Tourist bus. They don't notice anything at first but then they see the bus stop. Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett are a couple vacationing in Morocco when Blanchett is badly wounded. They are taken to the nearest village where she can be treated. In the United States, a Mexican nanny (Adriana Barazza) takes two of the children she is babysitting to Mexico on her son's wedding, but has trouble getting back. And in Japan, a Japanese deaf-mute teen rebel (Rinko Kikuchi) desperately tries to cure her lonlieness. We do not know how these stories are connected at first, because the timelines do not work in the same way. But it will gradually become clear, not as a big relevation or twist but as a realization made over many hints.



Babel is one of the most powerful movies I've seen this year. It contains gorgeous, Oscar worthy cinematography by Rodrigo Prieta (who should have won the Oscar last year for Brokeback Mountain), and Innaritu brings a sense of genius to his direction. There are two scenes of grandiosity, like the Mexican wedding or a nightclub Kikuchi goes to, where the exremely loud music occaisonally is turned off completely so we can slip inside her deaf, silent world. Then from these fun scenes the movie takes a dark turn into the emotionally unbearable - watching Barazza stumble across the desert with her children is heartbreaking, and her plea to the border patrol...

Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett give very good performances, but somehow they seem weaker when compared to Rinko Kikuchi, an face that will be new to American audiences. In fact, all performances this year seem weak when compared to Rinko Kikuchi's. She blows everyone out of the water. She communicates so much without speaking you feel you could read her mind. Her character is unable, because of her disability, to properly express her grief over her mother's suicide. Innaritu makes the right choice letting most of the screen time be on her storyline. Koji Yakusho, as her father, is another fine performance in this movie. Barazza is herself worthy of an Oscar nomination. Innaritu brings great performances from his Moroccan non-actors, a skill most Hollywood director's don't understand. They would not be able to handle anything beyond Pitt and Blanchett. Gael Garcia Bernal brings a surprising amout of gusto to a very small role, and we worry about his character at the end. He embodies the kind of person children and most adults like before ever really knowing him in the first place.

Although Gustavo Santaolalla composed the score I was not really aware of it. Where is it? Two key pieces of music at the end, are not composed originally for the film. When Blanchett is lifted in the helicopter it plays Santaolalla's own "Iguaza" which was previously used in Michael Mann's The Insider (1999). And the final piece played at the end is another piece by a different Japanese composer. I wonder...?

Babel, with all due credit to Innaritu, is a film for the actors, and since the actors in this film are extraordinary, this is a great film.

NEW RELEASES - Kekexili ****

SPOILERS

Kekexili: Mountain Patrol begins with the brutal murder of a man. Why was he murdered? The details slowly become clear. He was a volunteer citizen's patrol to protect an endangered species, the Tibetan Antelope - the last of which live on the plains of Tibet. Poachers make a living out of selling their pelts. And so it seems, do the Mountain Patrol themselves: they are so short on money, they often sell pelts they have confiscated from the poachers. The line between poacher and patrol is never so obvious.

A journalist from Beijing comes to Tibet trying to interview a famous Mountain Patroller named Ritai. He arrives to see the funeral of one of the patrollers, the same one we saw murdered by the poachers in the opening scene. He gets to interview Ritai when he tells him if the Patrol gets more publicity in the paper it might get government funding.

We learn of how the Patrol has been searching for the same "boss" poacher for years - most of the people they catch are just smugglers, who they let go. Sometimes, the smugglers even help them like in a scene where they push a truck out of the mud.

Ritai thinks he has a chance to get the boss poacher and obsessively plods up the mountains, leaving behind men in dangerous situations until he has almost none left and there isn't enough fuel to get back or guns to fight.



Kekexili reminded me in many ways of a western. The bleakness of the scenery, the blurred lines between good and evil. The scenes where the Mountain Patrol comes across near a hundred carcasses of the Tibetan Antelope at a time are devastating.



Although the Mountain Patrol doesn't seem sucessful at the end of the movie, there is a note at the end which tells us how fast the popularion of the Tibetan Antelope has recovered from near extinction to now a healthy number after China's government finally started their own Mountain Patrol. The heroes in this movie will not have their names in the History Books, but all who know of what they did and saved will take them as an inspiration.

In Case You Were Wondering About My Taste in Film:

What Could be the Greatest Films of All Time:



1. Days of Heaven (1978) dir. Terrence Malick
2. Jules et Jim (Jules and Jim)(1962) dir. Francois Traffaut
3. Fanny och Alexander (Fanny and Alexander) (1982) dir. Igmar Bergman
4. The Third Man (1949) dir. Carol Reed
5. Ran (1985) dir. Akira Kurosawa
6. Fitzcarraldo (1982) dir. Werner Herzog
7. L’Espirito de la Colmena (The Spirit of the Beehive) (1973) dir. Victor Erice
8. La Battaglia di Algeri (The Battle of Algiers) (1968) dir. Gillo Pontecorvo
9. Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989) dir. Woody Allen
10. La Strada (1954) dir. Frederico Fellini
11. Apocalypse Now (1979) dir. Francis Coppola
12. North by Northwest (1959) dir. Alfred Hitchcock
13. The Grapes of Wrath (1940) dir. John Ford
14. Il Buono, il Brutto, il Cattivo (The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly) (1965) dir. Sergio Leone
15. The Last Wave (1977) dir. Peter Weir
16. Suna no Onna (Woman in the Dunes) (1964) dir. Hiroshi Teshigahara
17. Paper Moon (1973) dir. Peter Bogdanovich
18. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969) dir. George Hill
19. Nashville (1975) dir. Robert Altman
20. Salaam Bombay! (1988) dir. Mira Nair
21. Ugetsu Monogatari (Ugetsu) (1953) dir. Kenji Mizoguchi
22. Baraka (1992) dir. Ron Fricke
22. La Regle du Jeu (The Rules of the Game) (1939) dir. Jean Renoir
23. The Thin Red Line (1998) dir. Terrence Malick
24. Shichinin no Samurai (The Seven Samurai) (1954) dir. Akira Kurosawa
25. All Quiet on the Western Front (1930) dir. Lewis Milestone


A Scene from Baraka.

26. The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) dir. David Lean
27. Vertigo (1958) dir. Alfred Hitchcock
28. Du Rififi Chez le Hommes (Rififi) (1955) dir. Jules Dassin
29. Popiol e Diament (Ashes and Diamonds) (1958) dir. Andrzej Wajda
30. Hiroshima, Mon Amour (1959) dir. Alan Rensais
31. Det Sjunde Inseglet (The Seventh Seal) (1957) dir. Igmar Bergman
32. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) dir. Milos Forman
33. Midnight Cowboy (1969) dir. John Schelsinger
34. Nights of Cabiria (1957) dir. Frederico Fellini
35. American Graffiti (1973) dir. George Lucas
36. Rebel Without a Cause (1955) dir. Nicholas Ray
37. Topio stin Omichli (Landscape in the Mist) (1988) dir. Theo Angeloupos
38. The Mission (1986) dir. Roland Joffe
39. A Woman Under the Influence (1974) dir. John Cassavettes
40. Aguirre: der Zorn Gottes (Aguirre: the Wrath of God) (1972) dir. Werner Herzog
41. The Godfather Part II (1974) dir. Francis Coppola
42. Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975) dir. Peter Weir
43. Citizen Kane (1941) dir. Orson Welles
44. Bringing Up Baby (1938) dir. Howard Hawks
45. 2001: A Space Odessey (1968) dir. Stanely Kubrick
46. The Godfather (1972) dir. Francis Coppola
47. La Grande Illusion (Grand Illusion) (1937) dir. Jean Renoir
48. 8 ½ (1963) dir. Frederico Fellini
49. Raging Bull (1980) dir. Martin Scorcese
50. Psycho (1960) dir. Alfred Hitchcock

Picnic at Hanging Rock

51. The Lion in Winter (1968) dir. Anthony Harvey
52. Casablanca (1942) dir. Michael Curtiz
53. Lawrence of Arabia (1962) dir. David Lean
54. The Killing Fields (1984) dir. Roland Joffe
55. The Wizard of Oz (1939) dir. Victor Fleming, Melvin LeRoy and King Vidor
56. La Belle et la Bete (Beauty and the Beast) (1946) dir. Jean Cocteau
57. Brazil (1985) dir. Terry Gilliam
58. Metropolis (1927) dir. Fritz Lang
59. I 400 Colpi (The 400 Blows) (1959) dir. Francois Traffaut
60. Dr Strangelove, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964) dir. Stanely Kubrick
61. L’avventura (1960) dir. Michelangelo Antonioni
62. Rear Window (1954) dir. Alfred Hitchcock
63. M (1931) dir. Fritz Lang
64. Trois Coleurs Trilogy (Three Colors) (1993-1994) dir. Krzysztof Kieslowsky
65. The Great Escape (1963) dir. John Sturges
66. Brief Encounter (1945) dir. David Lean
67. La Dolce Vita (1960) dir. Frederico Fellini
68. The Big Sleep (1946) dir. Howard Hawks
69. A Night at the Opera (1935) dir. Sam Wood and Edmund Goulding
70. Taxi Driver (1976) dir. Martin Scorsece
71. Chelovek s Kino-Apparatom (Man With a Movie Camera (1929) dir. Dziga Vertov
72. High Noon (1952) dir. Fred Zinnemann
73. Unagi (The Eel) (1998) dir. Shohei Imamura
74. Aleksandr Nevskiy (Alexander Nevsky) (1938) dir. Segei Eisenstein
75. Black Narcissus (1947) dir. Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger

Trois Coleurs: Rouge




76. On the Waterfront (1954) dir. Elia Kazan
77. A Night to Remember (1955) dir. Roy Baker
78. The Manchurian Candidate (1962) dir. John Frankenheimer
79. Yojimbo (1961) dir. Akira Kurosawa
80. Les Enfants du Paradis (Children of Paradise) (1945) dir. Michael Carne
81. The Phantom of the Opera (1925) dir. Rupert Julian
82. Sunset Boulevard (1950) dir. Billy Wilder
83. Die Blechtrommel (The Tin Drum) (1979) dir. Volker Schlondorff
84. Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens (Nosferatu) (1922) dir. Friedrich Murnau
85. M*A*S*H (1970) dir. Robert Altman
86. The Entertainer (1960) dir. Tony Richardson
87. A Bout de Souffle (Breatless) (1960) dir. Jean Luc-Godard
88. The Conversation (1974) dir. Francis Coppola
89. A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) dir. Elia Kazan
90. 12 Angry Men (1957) dir. Sidney Lumet
91. Faces (1968) dir. John Cassavettes
92. Bonnie and Clyde (1969) dir. Arthur Penn
93. The Piano (1993) dir. Jane Campion
94. Easy Rider (1969) dir. Dennis Hopper
95. Ship of Fools (1965) dir. Stanely Kramer
96. The Wild Bunch (1969) dir. Sam Peckinpah
97. Z (1969) dir. Costa-Gavras
98. Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966) dir. Mike Nichols
99. Chinatown (1974) dir. Roman Polanksi
100. All the President’s Men (1976) dir. Alan Paluka

All the President's Men

101. The Fortune Cookie (1966) dir. Billy Wilder
102. La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc (The Passion of Joan of Arc) (1928) dir. Carl Dreyer
103. Ostre Sledovande Vlaky (Closely Watched Trains) (1967) dir. Jiri Menzel
104. Hud (1962) dir. Martin Ritt
105. Rashomon (1950) dir. Akira Kurosawa
106. Singing in the Rain (1951) dir. Stanely Donen
107. Gunga Din (1939) dir. George Stevens
108. Judgment at Nuremberg (1961) dir. Stanely Kramer
109. Le Samourai (1967) dir. Jean Pierre Melville
110. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945) dir. Elia Kazan
111. Rosemary's Baby (1968) dir. Roman Polanksi
112. The Last Picture Show (1971) dir. Peter Bogdanovich
113. Network (1976) dir. Sidney Lumet
114. Walkabout (1971) dir. Nicholas Roeg
115. Rebecca (1940) dir. Alfred Hitchcock
116. Cool Hand Luke (1967) dir. Stuart Rosenberg
117. Tirez Sur Le Pianiste (Shoot the Piano Player) (1960) dir. Francois Traffaut
118. Breaking Away (1979) dir. Peter Yates
119. Scener ur ett Aktenskap (Scenes from a Marriage) (1973) dir. Igmar Bergman
120. Pat Garret and Billy the Kid (1973) dir. Sam Peckinpah
121. Mouchette (1967) dir. Robert Bresson
122. Kundun (1997) dir. Martin Scorsece
123. Some Like it Hot (1959) dir. Billy Wilder
124. Roma, Citta Aperta(Open City) (1945) dir. Robert Rosellini
125. Rhapsody in Blue (1945) dir. Irving Rapper


Kundun

126. Taksi-Blyuz (Taxi Blues) (1990) dir. Pavel Loungine
127. 12 Monkeys (1995) dir. Terry Gilliam
128. Hannah and Her Sisters (1988) dir. Woody Allen
129. Kumonosu Jo (Throne of Blood) (1957) dir. Akira Kurosawa
130. All the King’s Men (1949) dir. Robert Rossen
131. Offret (The Sacrifice) (1986) dir. Anrei Tarkovsky
132. Mononoke-Hime (Princess Mononoke) (1999) dir. Hayao Miyazaki
133. Amarcord (1973) dir. Frederico Fellini
134. Jaws (1975) dir. Steven Spielberg
135. Nuovo Cinema Paradiso (Cinema Paradiso) (1989) dir. Giuseppe Tornatore
136. Schindler’s List (1993) dir. Steven Spielberg
137. Do the Right Thing (1989) dir. Spike Lee
138. JFK (1991) dir. Oliver Stone
139. Annie Hall (1977) dir. Woody Allen
140. Le Souffle au Coeur (Murmur of the Heart) (1971) dir. Louis Malle
141. The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) dir. Michael Curtiz
142. The Song of Bernadette (1943) dir. Henry King
143. Dare mo Shiranai (Nobody Knows) (2004) dir. Hirokezu Kore-eda
144. Koyaanisqatsi (1982) dir. Godfrey Reggio
145. A Clockwork Orange (1971) dir. Stanely Kubrick
146. The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933) dir. Alexander Korda
147. Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975) dir. Terry Jones and Terry Gilliam
148. Blade Runner (1982) dir. Ridley Scott
149. Manhattan (1979) dir. Woody Allen
150. Double Indemnity (1944) dir. Billy Wilder

The Private Life of Henry VIII

151. Kakushi-Toride no San-Akunin (The Hidden Fortress) (1958) dir. Akira Kurosawa
152. Paths of Glory (1957) dir. Stanely Kubrick
153. Ninotcka (1939) dir. Ernst Lubitsch
154. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939) dir. Frank Capra
155. Duck Soup (1933) dir. Leo McCarey
156. Les Enfants Terribles (1943) dir. Jean Pierre Melville
157. The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1988) dir. Philp Kaufman
158. Au Revior Les Enfants (1987) dir. Louis Malle
159. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) dir. John Huston
160. Smultronstallet (Wild Strawberries) (1957) dir. Igmar Bergman
161. The Searchers (1956) dir. John Ford
162. To Kill a Mockingbird (1962) dir. Robert Mulligan
163. Pulp Fiction (1994) dir. Quentin Tarantino
164. Hoop Dreams (1994) dir. Steve James
165. The Night of the Hunter (1955) dir. Charles Laughton
166. Ukigusa (Floating Weeds) (1959) dir. Yasujiro Ozu
167. Wonder Boys (2000) dir. Curtis Hanson
168. Sullivan’s Travels (1941) dir. Preston Sturges
169. Murder on the Orient Express (1974) dir. Sidney Lumet
170. Two for the Road (1967) dir. Stanely Donen
171. The African Queen (1951) dir. John Huston
172. Bin-Jip (3-Iron) (2005) dir. Kim Ki-Duk
173. The Apartment (1960) dir. Billy Wilder
174. American Beauty (1999) dir. Sam Mendes
175. The Graduate (1967) dir. Mike Nichols


Michael Douglas and Tobey Maguire in Wonder Boys


176. East of Eden (1954) dir. Elia Kazan
177. Pasqualino Settebellezze (Seven Beauties) (1975) dir. Lina Wertmuller
178. The China Syndrome (1979) dir. James Bridges
179. Monty Python’s Life of Brian (1979) dir. Terry Jones
180. Le Charme Discret de la Bourgeoisie (The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie) (1972) dir. Luis Bunel
181. Ladri di Biciclette (The Bicycle Thief) (1948) dir. Vittorio de Sica
182. Giant (1956) dir. George Stevens
183. Los Olividados (1950) dir. Luis Bunel
184. Platoon (1986) dir. Oliver Stone
185. In the Heat of the Night (1967) dir. Norman Jewison
186. Men With Guns (1997) dir. John Sayles
187. Cidade de Deus (City of God) (2003) dir. Fernando Mereilles
188. The Heiress (1949) dir. William Wyler
189. Traffic (2000) dir. Steven Soderbergh
190. The Philadelphia Story (1940) dir. Geroge Cukor
191. Fargo (1996) dir. Joel Coen and Ethan Coen
192. Da Hong Deng Long Gao Gao Gua (Raise the Red Lantern) (1991) dir. Zhang Yimou
193. Goodfellas (1990) dir. Martin Scorsece
194. Antonia (Antonia's Line) (1995) dir. Marleen Gorris
195. Almost Famous (2000) dir. Cameron Crowe
196. Home of the Brave (1949) dir. Mark Robson
197. The New World (2006) dir. Terrence Malick
198. Tonari no Totoro (My Neighbor Totoro) (1988) dir. Hayao Miyazaki
199. The Year of Living Dangerously (1982) dir. Peter Weir
200. The Crying Game (1992) dir. Neil Jordan


My Neighbor Totoro


Jaye Davidson and Stephen Rea in The Crying Game

201. Kikujiro (1996) dir. Takeshi Kitano
202. The Player (1992) dir. Robert Altman
203. Sophie’s Choice (1982) dir. Alan Paluka
204. The Hustler (1961) dir. Robert Rossen
205. Rue Cases Negres (Sugar Cane Alley) (1983) dir. Euzhan Palcy
206. The Thin Blue Line (1988) dir. Errol Morris
207. La Vita e Bella (Life is Beautiful) (1998) dir. Roberto Benigni
208. Earth (1998) dir. Deepa Mehta
209. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1978) dir. Steven Spielberg
210. They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? (1969) dir. Sydney Pollack
211. Don't Look Now (1972) dir. Nicholas Roeg
212. Rocco e is Suoi Fratelli (Rocco and His Brothers) (1960) dir. Luchino Visconti
213. Hong Gao Liang (Red Sorghum) (1988) dir. Zhang Yimou
214. Little Miss Sunshine (2006) dir. Valerie Faris and Jonathan Dayton
215. Moonstruck (1987) dir. Norman Jewison
216. Children of a Lesser God (1986) dir. Randa Haines
217. The River (1951) dir. Jean Renoir
218. Sounder (1972) dir. Martin Ritt
219. Tootsie (1982) dir. Sydney Pollack
220. The Deer Hunter (1978) dir. Michael Cimino
221. The Quiet Man (1952) dir. John Ford
222. Touch of Evil (1958) dir. Orson Welles
223. Roman Holiday (1953) dir. William Wyler
224. El Angel Exterminador (The Exterminating Angel) (1962) dir. Luis Bunel
225. Orfeu Negro (Black Orpheus) (1959) dir. Marcel Camus
226. Pather Panchali (1955) dir. Satyajit Ray
227. Alexis Zorbas (Zorba the Greek) (1964)dir. Michael Cacoyannis
228. Harold and Maude (1971) dir. Hal Ashby
229. The Fisher King (1991) dir. Terry Gilliam
230. Perriot le Fou (1965) dir. Jean Luc-Godard
231. Umberto D. (1952) dir. Vittorio di Sica
232. The Magnificent Ambersons (1948) dir. Orson Welles
233. Bronenosets Potyomkin (Battleship Potemkin) (1925) dir. Sergei Eisenstein
234. 28 Days Later (2002) dir. Danny Boyle
235. What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993) dir. Lasse Halstrom